The Secret of Joy (19 page)

Tim never did show up that night. Ellie had dried her tears, freshened her lipstick, and returned to the table. She even managed to eat. And laugh. “I have to remember that these couples represent the possibilities. The best of marriage,” she’d said. “They’re an inspiration. Even if Tim isn’t here to meet them.”

Rebecca was truly beginning to adore Ellie and her optimism.

“We can cut to the beach here.” Theo led her down a long, winding path. They walked in silence for a bit, the late September night air so fresh, so perfectly balanced between still warm and cool. Rebecca stopped and just breathed, and Theo smiled. “I do that a lot. Ellie will be needing to do a lot of that, too.”

“You said you knew happily married couples, right? It is
possible. Like the couples Ellie invited. Happily married. Finishing each other’s sentences.”

“It’s more than possible,” he said, kicking at the leaves under their feet. “My parents had a crappy marriage, but my grandparents seemed loving till they died, within a few days of each other. The doctor said my grandfather died of a broken heart without his beloved.”

Rebecca smiled, her dear tiny paternal grandparents coming to mind. Murray and Mildred Strand—who’d dressed up for dinner every night, even in their own Brooklyn apartment—had died within days of each other of natural causes. “My father’s parents, too. Oh, what a sweet, sweet couple they were.”

He squeezed her hand for a moment. “See, it is possible.”

Her hand tingled and she wanted to slip it into his, but she didn’t. “What’s so amazing is that my grandparents were set up on a blind date, by their families, and they were expected to like each other,
expected
being an order, really, and they fell in love on the first date and were married within two weeks. And it was happily ever after for the next sixty years.”

“Maybe not happily ever after on a daily basis, though. I’m sure they went through their share of hard times and tragedies like my grandparents.”

“That’s the thing. They did. But nothing was able to tear them apart. Was it the time? What?”

Theo shrugged. “I think people overlooked a lot in the past. Social mores, customs, signs of the time, whatever you want to call it, had a lot to do with staying power. What was considered ‘acceptable’ thirty or forty years ago, a certain acceptance of your fate, isn’t now. And what wasn’t acceptable then, like
leaving a bad marriage, is. Not much is swept under the rug these days—and that’s a good thing. People are always saying they wished life could be simple like it was in the fifties, but that’s bullshit, really. Just because you didn’t talk about some very big problems or acknowledge them didn’t mean life was simple or easy. It must have been very difficult for some.”

“Agreed,” she said, letting his words of wisdom hang in the air. “But now that so much
is
acceptable socially, like never getting married, why would someone like Tim get married when he doesn’t want to be in a committed, monogamous relationship with his wife? Is it that he wants some of what marriage offers? Maybe he really did love Ellie, but then—I don’t know.”

How was she possibly going to help on the Rocky Relationships Tour when she couldn’t answer these questions? Perhaps the questions just had to be posed. That gave her some comfort, something to hang on to. Maybe it was more about asking the questions than answering them.

“And then there’s the flip side,” Theo said. “Someone like Ellie who wants to be married so bad that she ignores even the flashing neon warning signs. Maybe she invested so much in the relationship that she couldn’t imagine breaking up with him. Even though it meant starting out marriage on a rocky path.”

“Maybe a couple just has to be madly in love.”

“But that ‘in love’ feeling doesn’t necessarily last. The relationship has to be backed up by other stuff. Like maturity.”

As they neared Theo’s house, Rebecca could hear Spock barking. “He must know you’re coming.”

“He knows my footsteps,” Theo said. “And I’m sure he smells his fajitas. Come on in. Give me a second to find his leash and we’ll walk you back to Finch’s.”

Rebecca’s heart leaped at the thought of going inside, of seeing where he lived, where he sat, ate, slept. Took showers. She walked in behind him and smiled. Not a black leather piece to be found. Spock had a plush bed near the stone fireplace. The house was so nice that Rebecca wondered if he’d lived here with a woman.

She sat down on the sofa, a wood base covered with cushions in a subtle leaf design. It looked like nature. The entire downstairs did, with its sisal rug and bark curtain rods that held muslin drapes. “Your house is beautiful,” she said as he attached Spock’s leash. “Did you build most of the furniture yourself?”

“Actually, yes. That’s where I make most of my money.” He stood by the door with Spock at the ready, but she wanted to stay. She was starting to really like this guy. Which was why she got up.

And within five minutes, they were at Finch’s.

“I built that swing for Marianne two years ago,” he said, gesturing at the beautiful swing for two on the side porch.

So of course she sat down on it and he sat next to her and kicked off the porch to sway it. Above them were twinkling white stars in the black sky, a crescent moon. She stared up at them, forcing herself not to make a wish. Forcing herself not to fall for this gorgeous, insightful, intelligent, wonderful guy.

They sat so close she would barely have to move an inch to kiss him.

“You still wish on stars?” he asked.

“I see that mind reading is among your many talents. Though actually, if I were honest, I’d tell you I was making myself
not
wish on a star.”

“Complicated?”

“Very,” she said, one perfect twinkling star beckoning her. “Last night I came out here and wished that this would all make sense, my being here. That I’m supposed to be here, that I’m doing the right thing.”

“Worried you’re not?”

“Joy doesn’t want me here,” she said. “And then there’s
this
.”

“This?”

She hesitated, then just blurted out, “I’m sitting on a porch swing with a man I want to kiss, when I have a live-in boyfriend who’s waiting for me to come home.”

He smiled. “Do you want to go home?”

She glanced at the moon, at the perfect sliver of it. “I don’t know. This doesn’t feel like home. I’m not in my own life. I’m trying to foist myself in someone else’s life. I’ve done that kind of thing before. You know when you’re hanging on too long to a relationship, and the person has made it clear you’re not wanted, but you can’t leave. That’s kind of how I feel—how I think Joy feels.”

He nodded. “And what about this guy you want to kiss. Is he adding more weirdness to the equation?”

“He’s more helping me figure things out, without his even knowing it.”

“Interesting how people do that. I’ll bet he’d let you test out that kiss, if you need to. Just saying.”

All she had to do was tilt up her face and in seconds she
could
test it out. The gentlest of breezes beckoned her closer, but she hesitated. If she was going to kiss this guy, this beautiful man, shouldn’t she be free to do so?

You’re not married
, she reminded herself.
That’s different
.

But it shouldn’t be so different. She and Michael were committed, they were living together. Though not exactly at the moment.

Why do I feel so comfortable with you?
she wanted to ask.
Why does this feel so comfortable? I’m in the middle of nowhere, somewhere else, wanting to kiss a guy I barely know. But a guy who makes me feel like I belong exactly where I am
.

I am here and here is where?

“This is probably where you should offer to see me to my door,” she said. “To keep me safe from coyotes and wild rabbits.”

“And me?”

“And you.”

With that, he got up and so did she, and he walked her to the front door. She used her key to go inside and he plucked a little purple flower from the ones that lined the bushes.

He tucked the flower behind her ear. “I’ll come get Charlie tomorrow around five. Sound good?”

“Perfect. How do I look?” she asked, turning to model her flower-adorned ear.

“Beautiful. Like always. Night,” he said, then walked off into the inky darkness under the stars.

• • •

The first thing Rebecca saw when she opened her eyes the next morning was the little purple flower. She’d put it in a teacup filled with water.

“You’re going to be in good hands this weekend,” she told Charlie.

And when Theo came to pick up the dog as promised, right on time at 5:00 p.m., with just a squeeze of the hand, no mention of their almost kiss, nothing except “I’ll be home after three on Sunday, so come pick him up anytime,” Rebecca knew that she was in good hands with him, too.

eleven

As Rebecca pulled up to Joy’s house, a stylish fifty-something woman came out and walked over to a car parked in the driveway. She rooted around in the backseat, then the trunk. The breath caught in Rebecca’s throat.

Pia Jayhawk. Rebecca was sure of it.

Her blond hair was cut in an A-line chin-length bob with heavy Louise Brooks bangs. She was dressed all in black, like a New Yorker, and had something resembling a belly dancer’s scarf with beads around her hips. Long metallic earrings dangled from her ears. Each arm sported several bracelets and bangles. She carried what looked like an easel into the house.

Everyone said Rebecca looked like her father, that aside from the chestnut brown wavy hair and the light brown eyes and the slightly long nose and the slightly wide mouth, there was something in her expression that reminded everyone of Daniel Strand. She wondered if Pia would recognize her. If she’d look at her and
know
.

Doubtful.

It took Rebecca a few minutes to leave the comfort zone of her car. But finally she collected her travel bag and her purse and rang the bell.

Joy opened the door a crack. “Remember our deal.”

Rebecca nodded, and Joy opened the door wider and gestured her through. She stepped into a small mudroom with tiny shoes and rubber rain boots and preschool paintings hung adorably on a clothesline across the narrow room. As Joy led the way into the living room, Rebecca immediately noticed that she and Joy did have similar taste in home décor. Folksy meets modern meets thrift store. The plush, comfortable cream-colored sofa with its interesting texture and colorful throw pillows, the big muted rug and interesting lamps with elephants as bases. Rebecca had a few lucky elephants among her possessions at Michael’s.

Michael’s. Interesting that Rebecca didn’t think of her home in New York as her apartment. It was and had always been Michael’s apartment.

“You know Ellie, of course,” Joy said.

Ellie was biting her lip and glancing out the window for Tim. She popped a cheese cube into her mouth. “Not here yet.” Rebecca watched Ellie’s expression alternate between hope and despair in the same second. She hoped Tim showed up this time.

“And this is Aimee and Charles Cutlass,” Joy said, leading her over to a thirtysomething couple who sat very close together on the love seat. “Aimee is a librarian and Charles is the manager of the Honda dealership in Brunswick.” They were both tall, thin redheads, but Aimee’s frizzy curls were
almost orange, and Charles’s hair was more auburn. They both wore white turtlenecks, khaki pants, and had matching navy blue windbreakers. Joy smiled at the couple. “Rebecca is the mediation specialist I mentioned would be joining us.” After a few minutes of small talk, Ellie pulled Rebecca away to the little table of refreshments by the window.

“I wonder what their story is,” Ellie whispered. “They seem to be very happily married. Right down to the matchy-matchy clothes.”

“
Seems
is always the key word,” Rebecca pointed out.

The doorbell rang, and Rebecca could feel Ellie stiffen.
Please be him
, she said silently for Ellie’s sake.

And it was. Rebecca breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of Tim Rasmussen. At least six feet three and with a football player’s neck, he filled the doorway and smiled awkwardly at Joy, then glanced around. His gaze rested on the now beaming Ellie and he gave a little wave. She ran over to him and whispered something in his ear. Rebecca heard him say, “I’ll try.”

Good enough for now.

Rebecca looked around, hoping for another glimpse of Pia Jayhawk. She heard a child’s voice, then the cutest giggle-laughter, and followed the sound, pretending to be in deep study of the small paintings along the living-room wall where it narrowed into a hallway. Through the French doors of what appeared to be a playroom, she saw Pia sitting on a big round rug, building a fort of blocks with Rex. Joy walked in, scooped up Rex, and hugged him tight, twirling around with him. Rebecca heard murmurings of “See you in two little days” and “You’re going to have so much fun with Grandma.” There
was another hug, and then Joy slipped back through the doors again. Rex settled himself in Pia’s lap on the rug and played with the long chain of her glasses.

Rebecca stared at Rex, her nephew, her father’s grandchild. She wanted to run into the playroom and get down on the floor and build a tower of blocks and make a Play-Doh cat. But now certainly wasn’t the time. Perhaps when they returned from the tour, Joy would agree to letting her join her and Rex at the playground or at the library for Story Time.

She watched as Harry Jones came in and did much the same as Joy had. Harry was very good-looking in an easygoing way, like a model in an L.L.Bean catalog, with his brown windswept hair and hazel eyes. Harry and Joy looked like a couple, looked like they belonged together. They had on the same low-slung jeans and J.Crew-ish sweaters and Merrells. They both had the same friendly kindness in their attractive faces. You could imagine going up to Joy in the produce section of a supermarket and asking her if she knew how to tell if the mangoes were fresh. And car-greenhorn Rebecca could easily see herself calling over to Harry at the gas station pump to ask if there was any point in using the premium gasoline.